The Letters to the Editor section of the AJC today was just chock-full of bigotry and bias. First you have several opponents of gay marriage wondering why the debate isn't remaining civil. The problem is that it's an equal rights issue, something that is int he Constitution, and thus does not engender civil debate. The only possible reason to be against it is bigotry. It would be one thing if opponents were following my suggestion of Civil Unions replacing marriages in the eyes of the government, seeing as marriage is a religious institution and really shouldn't be considered by the government at all. They are not, however, and most have made it clear that they are against gays having the same rights as the rest of us. Bigotry, plain and simple.

Then you have some dumbass complaing about how our leaders are paying attention to Iraq and ignoring "important" issues like gay marriage. Then someone writes that our leaders need to stop wasting time on gay marriage and worry more about the upcoming expiration of some assault weapons ban. Maybe they decided not to worry because banning assault weapons does nothing productive except add another minor crime to the list that would be attached to any criminal who uses one to commit crime. If they want an assault weapon, they'll get one, legal or not. It's not like someone who is going to rob a bank with an assault weapon is worried about a ban.

Then there's the guy who is pissed off that Bush is supposedly using some churches to energize his base. Is that right? No, but until black Democrats stop using their churches for the exact same thing, as they have been doing for years, it's hypocritical in the extreme to bitch. "Separation of Church and State," which, by the way, is not specifically in the Constitution, is a myth. It is belied by marriage, by religious groups getting tax breaks, by "Under God," and so many other things.